The photographic art you choose to place on your wall is ultimately the result of the vision of the photographer. This vision, coupled with what you wear to your session, the environment, the lighting, even the mood the subjects are in at the time of photographing, creates the work that you will want to proudly display on your walls forevermore.
What custom photography is ultimately about is choice and experience. Custom photography is about finding someone who will photograph your family, give you devoted 1:1 attention without the worry of who is next ‘in line’ or the feeling of a crowded portrait studio.
A custom photographer will typically show you a fairly extensive gallery culled to only show the good images that meet the photographers’ creative sensibilities.
Often the images are fully edited images which are colour corrected with blemishes and other distracting elements removed.
Custom photographers are also known as boutique studios, offering a range of products and unparalleled service. Think Porsche vs. Hyundai, Pumpkin Patch vs. Big W.
A custom photography experience should have you and your experience in mind.
Why Choose Custom Photography?
Custom photography is more of a luxury than your entry level cookie cutter chain experience. Custom photography truly is not for everyone; it requires a level of commitment, investment in time and money, forethought and planning on the part of the subject/client and requires a larger time commitment for the photographer as well.
Clients who enjoy taking a more active role in the creation of their families’ memories have the desire to have portrait art that is truly personalised. These more discerning clients have been known to budget and allot time for a custom photography session. Many clients opt for it to be a once a year special experience, some opt to have custom photography sessions done to record their child’s stages in life. Having said this, it is clear that custom photography is not in everyone’s budget, it is something that most families save for to splurge on from time to time to memorialise their children personalities.
There is a great deal of time involved in creating high end custom photography sessions for a client. The luxury of great service, better choices and a superb end product. The results of all this are heirloom quality images. The time invested at the session is only a small portion of time involved in this process.
Custom photography can be broken down into even more levels. There are on location, studio, mixed studio/on location, specialty location and destination type photographers. The beauty of custom photography is in the choices and in the luxury of those options. The customised service level you are sure to experience will be amazing. The knowledge that your final images are the result of someone caring about those moments so much that they take extra time ensuring that the artwork you receive is good enough to stand by with their name on it. That level of quality and commitment is all but lost in the age of “mass produced,” “mass marketed,” corporate “everyone is a number”. Custom photography is based on being unique to you.
Custom photography is more of a luxury than your entry level cookie cutter chain experience. Custom photography truly is not for everyone; it requires a level of commitment, investment in time and money, forethought and planning on the part of the subject/client and requires a larger time commitment for the photographer as well.
Clients who enjoy taking a more active role in the creation of their families’ memories have the desire to have portrait art that is truly personalised. These more discerning clients have been known to budget and allot time for a custom photography session. Many clients opt for it to be a once a year special experience, some opt to have custom photography sessions done to record their child’s stages in life. Having said this, it is clear that custom photography is not in everyone’s budget, it is something that most families save for to splurge on from time to time to memorialise their children personalities.
There is a great deal of time involved in creating high end custom photography sessions for a client. The luxury of great service, better choices and a superb end product. The results of all this are heirloom quality images. The time invested at the session is only a small portion of time involved in this process.
Custom photography can be broken down into even more levels. There are on location, studio, mixed studio/on location, specialty location and destination type photographers. The beauty of custom photography is in the choices and in the luxury of those options. The customised service level you are sure to experience will be amazing. The knowledge that your final images are the result of someone caring about those moments so much that they take extra time ensuring that the artwork you receive is good enough to stand by with their name on it. That level of quality and commitment is all but lost in the age of “mass produced,” “mass marketed,” corporate “everyone is a number”. Custom photography is based on being unique to you.
The digital revolution has brought amazing flexibility and ability to control various factors during the image taking and making process. Photographers, the hobbyist, the professional and the amateur all benefit from this ability to manipulate pixels. However, with flexibility comes a price. Digital camera equipment is still considerably more expensive when you factor in its’ lifespan, the need for additional resources for processing those images, the time it takes to get a usable image and the effort that goes into creating a work of photographic art. We all know that you can go to the local K Mart and pay a 25c for a print. As a client you may wonder why you may pay upwards of $40 for a custom photography print. Photographers hear this statement every once in a while:
“How in the world can you charge $60 for an 8×10 if it costs me less than $1 to print at a local store?”
The truth of the matter is much of the cost of a photographic print produced by a professional photographer has a lot to do with the time, equipment costs, artistic vision and reputation of the photographer, not to mention expertise and the usual costs of running a legitimate business. Approaching it from a time standpoint, let’s imagine that you have hired a photographer who has work that you love. Here is an example of a time break down:
Booking time:
30 minutes to one hour (client contact time + paperwork)
Pre-session prep time (30 mins – 1 hour, includes equipment and back up equipment checks + vehicle checks)
Pre-session prep time (30 mins – 1 hour, includes equipment and back up equipment checks + vehicle checks)
1.15-30 minutes prep time in on location
1 hour to 3 hours with client photographing subject/s
30-45 minutes uploading time from digital cards to computer
30-45 minutes time spent backing up the original images
2-5 hours editing time to present you with a diverse gallery of edited images
1 hour prep time getting ready for ordering
1 hour sorting through and checking order
30 minutes-1 hour prep time for delivery
30 minutes-1 hour getting order shipped
Any additional phone time or time needed for add on ordering, shipment issues etc
In this example, the time spent per client can range from 8 hours to 16 hours – dependent on the photographer’s level of service. This is time dedicated only to ONE session. When the photographer charges $100-$250 for the photo shoot (aka SESSION FEE), you are not just paying for the two hours of session time, you are paying the photographer for 8 - 16 hours complete time for your session.
30-45 minutes uploading time from digital cards to computer
30-45 minutes time spent backing up the original images
2-5 hours editing time to present you with a diverse gallery of edited images
1 hour prep time getting ready for ordering
1 hour sorting through and checking order
30 minutes-1 hour prep time for delivery
30 minutes-1 hour getting order shipped
Any additional phone time or time needed for add on ordering, shipment issues etc
In this example, the time spent per client can range from 8 hours to 16 hours – dependent on the photographer’s level of service. This is time dedicated only to ONE session. When the photographer charges $100-$250 for the photo shoot (aka SESSION FEE), you are not just paying for the two hours of session time, you are paying the photographer for 8 - 16 hours complete time for your session.
Regarding equipment costs, a good quality professional camera with a selection of good optical quality lenses and digital storage mediums plus a computer set up can run from $10,000-$30,000, depending on the photographer. Even though you can purchase a really good quality digital SLR for about $2100, there are still other costs related to photography. A good lens for portrait photography can run from $900 to $2500. A dependable computer system with software loaded for business and creative usage can run $2500 to $8000 depending on the photographer. Studio equipment including lights and backdrops. Then come lab costs for specialty products. A good photographer knows their professional lab is an integral part of their success. These labs often cost more and offer a range of products that allows the custom photographer to continually offer new, innovative products for the discerning client.
Discussion on other costs of running a photography business could take a while so we’ll skip many of the intricate details. An overview: the costs of running the business, taxes, studio rental/mortgage, vehicle costs, costs of advertising/marketing, costs of sample pieces that the photographer will likely bring to your session, insurance costs ~ including public liability, so that if you trip and brake your leg the photographer doesn't have to fork out thousands of dollars in medical bills, not to mention all the costs that goes into buying and collecting props so we can take beautiful pictures of your loved ones, as well as on-going training & workshops so that we can keep on improving our services etc.
Often time’s clients will mention to their photographer that X studio only charges $50 for an entire CD of high resolution images otherwise known as a “shoot & burn photographer”. The fact is that those photographers make their money on volume, not on customised 1:1 service and in my opinion provide quantity not quality.
There is an old story about a ship that cost a company millions of dollars. Something went wrong in the engine room and the ship was stuck in dock. They called various “experts” who spent weeks trying to fix the issue to no avail, and at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars. Finally an older gentleman was called in who simply brought in his small tool bag and a hammer. He set about pinging on various parts of the vast engine with his hammer, finally settling on one area. He spent a few minutes working on that area, took out a few tools and fixed whatever what was wrong. After a few moments the man straightened up, looked at the captain and instructed him to “start her up.” The captain disbelievingly went to get the engines started while the man sat in the engine room listening as the engine roared to life. The man tipped his hat as he exited the ship to the staff who sat dumbfounded because they had seen all the experts come on board for days with their expensive equipment, only to have the ship not fixed. This man did it in a few minutes with a few pings of his hammer!
A few days passed and the man sent the shipping company a bill for $10,000. The accounting department contacted him immediately. All the rumors mentioned that this man had only spent “a few minutes” fixing the ship “with his hammer and a few other random tools”. When questioned about why his bill was for $10,000 (did he accidentally leave an extra zero on the bill?), the man confidently responded: “In fact the time was worth $1,000. The other $9,000 was for the years of experience and the ability to discern the issue as quickly as possible for the company.”
Now I’m not saying that photographers fix large ships, but being in demand and being well known for quality work and having a good reputation, often costs time on the photographer’s part (years of practice, study, experience, etc.). A photographer’s expertise comes at a cost, their time learning their craft and learning the intricacies of lighting and the commitment put forth on their end to create a persona about their business that oozes professionalism. A great number of photographers go a very long time from when they purchase their first good camera to making money at the business of photography. Many photographers, when first starting out, rush in thinking that the business will be easily profitable in no time. How expensive could it be to get a camera and use it to create their dream? These photographers often undervalue what they do because they have the realisation that they do not have experience or expertise, but are very adept at pushing the shutter on the camera. Many times these casual “professionals” neglect to factor in the cost of business, the cost of equipment, software, backups, etc. When you hire a photographer of sound reputation, you are hiring an expert, one that knows that they must always reinvest in their business to create the reputation of being top notch. To create good work a photographer possesses not only sound knowledge in the technical and creative aspects of photography but also good, reliable equipment and back up equipment.
The photographer who desires to be known as better/best/unparalleled reputation knows that the most important thing they can do for their business is reliability and dependability. This is how reputations get built. Good work often is a wonderful side product of building that good reputation.
Credit source can be found here
Tamai x
